So after tons of tedious clips of people saying "it's great to be here!" the answer to this documentary's central question is "both are good?" That is such a cheap copout. I get that both are good in different ways and maybe they appeal to different people for their own reasons, but the director does not go into any depth at all.
Frankly this entire movie (90% or even more of the screen time) is just clips from over the many years of Fan Expo, of celebrity guests saying how great/fun/exciting it is to be at Fan Expo.
Aside from one lengthy and boring monologue about the relative strengths and weaknesses of Fan Expo and Comicon, that amounts to nothing other than a pointless word salad by a man who I suspect to be the director himself, nobody at all in this movie actually takes a serious stab at the question "which is better?" The few people who he interviews about being at both Fan Expo and Comicon, all in the same boring location btw, also just say how great both are without ever sayiing which one is better. Not that he ever tries to make them, or even just asks!
The movie points out that Fan Expo is bigger and actually owns Toronto Comicon, but doesn't dig into that at all. If you're comparing the two things and one of them literally owns the other, wouldn't that be an interesting and important thing to take a deeper look at?
Maybe, I don't know, talk to the owners and organizers of both conventions? Or at least just the staff?
The movie doesn't even make it clear that it is specifically about Fan Expo Canada in Toronto and the Toronto Comicon... you do realize that there are Fan Expos across North America and Comic-Cons around the globe every year, don't you? Did you bother doing any research at all before you made this documentary?
Focusing on Toronto's conventions is fine, but make it clear in the title. Or if you're looking at Fan Expo Vs. Comic-Cons in general, that's fine too, but you need to do a lot more investigation, and have a lot more interviews with actual meat on them instead of just using clips of people saying how great the convention they're at is.
Another problem I have is that the focus is almost entirely on Fan Expo with very little attention paid to Toronto Comicon at all. It seems like an afterthought. Most of the Comicon clips seem like they were all taken from the same walk through with the director simply saying hello to people and explaining what he is/we are looking at as we walk by.
Also it feels longer than 30 minutes. By that I mean the actual run time might be longer, I'm not doing a joke about how boring it is. In fact, aside from that long monologue that doesn't actually say anything meaningful, the clips are well edited and quick. Short enough that it kept me interested even though they were almost entirely irrelevant to the "Fan Expo Vs. Comicon" point. It's just fun seeing Fan Expo celebrities talk about how much they love seeing us fans one after another.
The documentary fails at taking an in depth look at the question it asks and really cops out by saying "they're both good in their own way", so I feel that it kind of wasted my time on that level. But the clips are well edited, fast and fun enough that it never gets boring, and there's lots of celebrities to see. It keeps positive, shows a lot of fans having fun, and delivers about all I could expect from an independent Youtube documentary made up mostly of clips.
Frankly this entire movie (90% or even more of the screen time) is just clips from over the many years of Fan Expo, of celebrity guests saying how great/fun/exciting it is to be at Fan Expo.
Aside from one lengthy and boring monologue about the relative strengths and weaknesses of Fan Expo and Comicon, that amounts to nothing other than a pointless word salad by a man who I suspect to be the director himself, nobody at all in this movie actually takes a serious stab at the question "which is better?" The few people who he interviews about being at both Fan Expo and Comicon, all in the same boring location btw, also just say how great both are without ever sayiing which one is better. Not that he ever tries to make them, or even just asks!
The movie points out that Fan Expo is bigger and actually owns Toronto Comicon, but doesn't dig into that at all. If you're comparing the two things and one of them literally owns the other, wouldn't that be an interesting and important thing to take a deeper look at?
Maybe, I don't know, talk to the owners and organizers of both conventions? Or at least just the staff?
The movie doesn't even make it clear that it is specifically about Fan Expo Canada in Toronto and the Toronto Comicon... you do realize that there are Fan Expos across North America and Comic-Cons around the globe every year, don't you? Did you bother doing any research at all before you made this documentary?
Focusing on Toronto's conventions is fine, but make it clear in the title. Or if you're looking at Fan Expo Vs. Comic-Cons in general, that's fine too, but you need to do a lot more investigation, and have a lot more interviews with actual meat on them instead of just using clips of people saying how great the convention they're at is.
Another problem I have is that the focus is almost entirely on Fan Expo with very little attention paid to Toronto Comicon at all. It seems like an afterthought. Most of the Comicon clips seem like they were all taken from the same walk through with the director simply saying hello to people and explaining what he is/we are looking at as we walk by.
Also it feels longer than 30 minutes. By that I mean the actual run time might be longer, I'm not doing a joke about how boring it is. In fact, aside from that long monologue that doesn't actually say anything meaningful, the clips are well edited and quick. Short enough that it kept me interested even though they were almost entirely irrelevant to the "Fan Expo Vs. Comicon" point. It's just fun seeing Fan Expo celebrities talk about how much they love seeing us fans one after another.
The documentary fails at taking an in depth look at the question it asks and really cops out by saying "they're both good in their own way", so I feel that it kind of wasted my time on that level. But the clips are well edited, fast and fun enough that it never gets boring, and there's lots of celebrities to see. It keeps positive, shows a lot of fans having fun, and delivers about all I could expect from an independent Youtube documentary made up mostly of clips.